Better Than Okay
by Sambev
Summary: You can‘t be lost if you have nowhere to be, Raph reminded himself. And since Raph had nowhere to be, in New York City or anywhere else, he couldn’t possible be lost.


His feet made a light padding sound against the greasy roofs as he bound over them feeling weightless, but his heart struggled and beat against his scarred plastron. The night was inky and black and the street lights below him made small orange circles like ghosts that led from street corner to corner. Raph didn't need the light though, the dark pushes him ahead, while his sai cut through it and lead the way.

As he clutched the handles, either the sweat soaked wrapping or his own taught knuckles, squeaked. Everything was squeaking it seemed, like his own skin was thin rubber stretched tightly over his bones. He'd begun to feel like that after the third day, but he'd already decided that being hungry wasn't so bad.

_"Perhaps the path to a clear mind can be found through a pure body."_

_Raph looked up from his crouched position at his master's feet, seriously, not knowing what he was talking about._

_"Have you considered purging Raphael?"_

_"Purging? No Sensei." He answered. Purging? Starving yourself like a girl before prom? He stifled his smile._

_"Ah, well you are still growing, perhaps it isn't the best path for you."_

_"Yes, sensei."_

That incident had little to do with Raph's current position but after the fifth day he remembered it. Now on the seventh day he remembered it again. Whether his master's words had had any effect on him he couldn't say, but why, why was everyone always trying to fix him?

Am I broken?

_He is broken._

Every once in a while, perhaps every ten minutes, not that Raph was counting or anything, he glanced behind himself and was sure he'd seen something darting behind a chimney in a flash of red. Voices, always voices whispering about him.

_He's the weakest one, and everyone knows it._

Raph ran just a little faster to avoid some chimneys where surely the people were hiding, waiting to get a glance at 'the freak'.

_He ran away_. They whisper but Raph pretends not the hear them, and he nearly can't over his ragged breathing. _And it's only been a week and he already wants to go home._

_He probably would if he weren't lost._

Was he lost? Raph stopped running, but it was slow and his ankles, maybe a little swollen, couldn't remember how to right away. His dark eyes didn't shine, but seemed another piece of the darkness around him, and his sai quivered frightened of its green captor.

You can't be lost if you have nowhere to be, Raph reminded himself. And since Raph had nowhere to be, in New York City or anywhere else, he couldn't possible be lost.

Raph hadn't been angry when he stormed out, but surely, now that he could think of it and actually remember it despite the miles of roof tops and days of 'purging' put between him and that moment, he had been out of his mind.

_"Hey Raph! Check this out!" Mikey threw himself in front of his brother as soon as Raphael emerged from his bedroom to gain his full attention. "Hold these." He offered Raph his nunchaku, and Raph held out his calloused palm with a roll of his eyes to accept them._

_Grinning Mike took several important looking steps backwards and did a hand stand. "Okay, now, would my lovely assistant toss my one of my nunchakus?"_

_"Eh?" Raph grinned and tossed them lightly._

_Mikey's ability to use his nunchaku with his feet was pretty interesting, but it only lasted a minute until he lost his balance and hit himself on the head with his own weapon._

_Raph laughed, Mikey laughed, and Raph realized he'd never heard himself laugh before. At least not like that he hadn't. It would seem Mikey hadn't either from the way he looked up at his brother._

_Leo and Donny peered around the corner. "You guys want waffles? It's the genius' newest creation." Leo hollered at them._

_Raph laugh again and was equally shocked at the same earnest sound that he had made now twice in one day._

Raph stepped forward, Leo's face smiling at him from the door way, but it faded by the second step he took and Raph was left alone again on some unknown roof top.

Below the orbs of the street lamps seemed to sway. Raph frowned at them as if he could threaten them, or himself, into serenity. Unsuccessful, he bound his way down the cat walks so he could feel his feet on solid ground.

His breath was beginning to come back to him but his lungs burned and his throat was choked with the foggy night air. His heart beat rapidly in his ankles and his veins seemed to pulse. He surveyed himself with some interest as if he was a ticking pipe bomb and crouched down to hug his knees.

_How did I get out here?_ His stomach growled, and he'd thought it would have stopped trying that by now.

The sai were still clutched in his hands. Painstakingly he uncurled his three fingered hands away from the over used weapons and let them clatter to the pavement where he contemplated them.

Movement from above caught his eye. Raphael craned his tense neck up, gazing at the pieces of dirty black clouds that boxed him in between the building walls and concrete. Then a figure leapt over his head some forty feet above. The legs were strong and the teeth barred. The eyes were hidden behind a mask that he could just make out to be red from the long ends trailing behind.

_Oh_, Raph thought as the image hit the other roofs and dissipated, _it's just me. Man, I'm scary._

_He is scary, you should see him when he's really mad._

Raph waved a hand defensively. When did he ever get mad? The dark eyes, sunken with exhaustion, slid shut without him knowing because he had already been dreaming when they were open.

His own face stared back into his. The eyes burning, fists clenched. He could see what he only ever felt. Hate.

Why did he hate?

He tried to find the answer in himself. His knuckles, in his image, bled from punching Leo in the throat and meeting his sword instead. As his mouth opened to spit out some threat he always regretted voicing his teeth were smeared with blood from a split lip.

Yet, all that was a long time ago. Seven days ago he'd really run out. He'd really run out, but he couldn't remember himself doing it. He couldn't see his brothers' faces, or his Sensei's, but instead his own snarling face reflecting around their cheerful home.

_"Aren't you hungry Raph?" Donny asked, looking nervous for approval of his cooking._

_Raphael looked up suddenly, he been listening to Leo who was talking about some book he'd read, and Mikey saying how cool it sounded if only it had been done as a comic book instead. "Yeah, I was just letting' it cool off." He picked up his fork and started to bring it to his mouth._

_"Raph wouldn't want to burn his tongue and have to be quiet for a few days." Mikey said, punching his brother lightly in the arm._

_Leo looked at Mike from the corner of his eye, "Maybe you should go and burn your tongue then."_

_Mikey pouted although his eyes shined and Raph tossed his head back a little to laugh at their exchange, but he couldn't bring the fork to his mouth. He couldn't look at his brothers because at that moment he felt like he had betrayed them. Raph pressed his palm over his mouth to mask the growing giggles he normally couldn't force himself to even fake but now couldn't seem to stop._

_"You're too mean Raph!" Mikey said, but was giggling too, then pretty soon all four of them were huddle together with wet eyes and shaking shoulders as they tried to man up and pull themselves together._

_The familiar tap of Splinter's walking stick gathered their attention and they grew respectfully quiet. Raph's breath caught in his throat, an unknown dread seizing him at the presence of his father._

_The old rat observed their barely suppressed laughter, and the corners of his mouth seemed to turn up slightly, "Are these waffles… normal?"_

Raph shivered and choked on his dry throat when a winter wind pushed its way through the alley where he crouched. His own snarling face with red teeth snapped at him when his eyes tentatively opened a sliver.

Another wind came through, so strong Raph nearly lost his grip on his knees. A trash can behind him fell and the cat walks rattled violently above.

_The stoic inquiry, seeming sincere, broke their contained laughter into the open._

_Seeming pleased his himself Splinter pulled up a chair between his sons. His keen eyes met Raph's own, and the turtle could feel his father prying into his mind. Still consumed with giggled he burst out, "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"_

_"What are you sorry for Raph?" Leo asked, wiping his eyes._

_Donny smiled awkwardly, "You don't have to eat it if it's bad…"_

_Raph's wild eyes swung towards his brother as if anything could possibly be less important at that moment. They swung back onto Splinter, who had risen, and although on the other side of the table reached for his son. "Raphael, give me your hand, my son"  
His hand twitched as if to obey, but Raphael shook his head and ran._

When did I stop running? Raph wondered and curled himself into a tighter ball. Just now?

A despairingly familiar clatter drew him from his dreaming, and he looked up in time to see his sai skid away into the street. He watched that through a wall of men in black pants and old sneakers. They hung off the cat walks and leaned against the walls. Raphael couldn't remember this group or exactly how he was 'victimized' them, but he was sure he must have at one point.

Raph drew himself up on his creaking knees and prepared himself for a fight.

They jeered at them, there was one grunt with a flashlight that he swung sickeningly around, hitting Raph's face to fill his vision with floating white spots. Glints of teeth and eyes, and glints of steel muddled in with his the rest of the useless sight.

"You scared freak?"

"Yeah, look at his hands shake!"

They laughed. _We all know what you did!_

Raphael's heart dropped but he held his fists a bit higher and narrowed his eyes. His eyelids creaking and taut like a breaking doll. He didn't lock his room and they would have went in. Looking, and touching. Over turning his mattress, shaking out his books and his pillows, opening the drawers…

A baseball bat struck him in the shoulder and his raised elbow. He ground his teeth so he didn't cry out. The assailant grinning proudly, but if he was a real villain he'd have gotten Raph in the head since it would have been so easy to do.

Raph grasped the bat and tore it away to wield as his own, but such a heavy blunt thing didn't fit his style.

_The freak doesn't know what to do with it!_

Raph swung the bat, but low, catching two under the knees as they pressed close and flipping them.

Another blunt-something, caught him square on the back of the neck where his shell didn't protect, and bat fell from Raph's hand. His grip was too weak.

The wind changed while he fell to his knees, oddly cooling, and the tails of his bandana fluttered around his neck and face.

He could see them, while Splinter stood in the doorway. He could feel the assaults all around him from puny awkward punks making a day of him. _'Look what I found!' Leo would say, face wrinkling in disgust and disappointment. He'd hold up the stained and wadded towel, crusted hard with copper colored self-hate. Shake it out, and his shame would fall out. That little piece of steel._

Raphael winced, striking out at one boy with him palm. The boys knee popped audibly, but not as audibly as his scream. For a moment the light flashed over Raph's outstretched hand, beneath his wrist brace the stained white bandage was barely visible. He stood up quickly and glared at them with his chin lowered, and all the boys backed away with a gasp.

As his circle widened he swung his leg to catch one in the neck, but stumbled back on his trembling knees.

_I can't believe him. He's so weak. He's so weak._ Leo's dull voice echoed in his head, or maybe it was his own voice, eyes averted as Raph tried to picture his face.

Raph struck out, not really sure in what direction. But he heard shattering glass and knew that was a bad sign. The light went dead with a startled scream. Did I do that? It hadn't felt like he'd hit anything at all…

His eyes slid shut again, although the necessity of them being open was not lost on him, because his eyes shut and his mind was beginning to follow.

_He's so weak, he can't possibly be my brother._

Raph sighed. What was he hearing?

Screams, flesh on flesh, wood and metal. A fight? Where was he?

Raph looked around him, although his eyes weren't adjusted to the dark, or the light coincidently. There was a silhouette of muscle and shell and bandana tails caught up in the moment. Oh, there I am, Raph realized. As he watched himself, sai outstretched, he thought, no, why am I holding them like that, don't thrust like that, use swords if you're going to use frontal attacks…

He watched himself take a hit to the chest, and fell back with his palms down to soften the impact like a dizzy kid on roller skates. The aggravated wounds tore open, and he could feel them begin to ooze.

The punks had begun to run, they always did eventually, it just depended on how long they waited. It looked like half of them had secretly limped away earlier anyway.

Raph shook his head because now there were three of him.

_What? You lost your mind or something?"_

"Yeah, I think so…" Raph muttered to himself.

A hand grasped around the back of his neck. More flashes of sneering blood stained teeth. A pointed light was shined into his right eye, and a small startled cry escaped him but he couldn't pull away because of hand on his neck. The light disappeared and a gentle hand felt at his wrist, and pinched the skin on the top of his hand.

Raph was still too dazed from having half his vision abused with white light, and he thought maybe the hand was there to keep his head from tilting over and rolling away. It must have been cut off during the fight. Then the grasping hand turned into the half hug and he was pressed warmly against another.

"I'm so glad you're okay…"

Donny, Raph reminded himself as he let his head fall more securely against his brother's neck. _He knows, don't let him near you. Don't let him touch you. He hates you._ The muscles began to twitch and tighten in response to his mind although he didn't want them to.

Is this me? Raph wondered, trying to look down on himself from where he sat. Or am I that voice? Am I those blood stained teeth? Or the empty body that's been running from voices for a week…

He was already pushing his brother away, his wild eyes finding their audience elsewhere.

His feet were already drawing him up towards the night air, though his knees and ankles cried out in protest, because his mind was ready to run again. His dark green skin glistened with days of dirty fog.

Thoughtfully he brought his knuckles to his mouth. Leo and Mikey were leaning in from either side as if to trap him. _They're just following rules, if you get lost and caught and exposed then they will too. Run Raph._

"What from though?" Raph answered, carefully eyeing shadows on shadows and voices.

_See how they're looking at you._

_Look at Leo with your sai, he wont give them back. They know what you've done._

"Do you know what I did?" Raph asked, his eyes caught on nothing widened and he shook his head while his eyes remained captive.

_They know! Don't bring it up moron. Run run!_

He finally managed to tear his eyes away and rubbed at his throbbing forehead with the heel of his hand then let it settle against his mouth. That was the worse part of him, egging him on with hate and sickness, trying to shut him up with the idle movement.

"I don't think…" Leo started, his katana never left their sheaths, and he held Raph's sai, and scrutinized them for the right words to say.

_Tell him he's a monster._ The weapons answered, but Leo ignored them. This brightened Raph disposition considerably, and he pushed his hand away and looked at it.

"What did you do Raph?" Mikey asked, he approached, his voice low and oddly serious.

_He's lost his mind and snapped, he's talking to shadows, and nothings and being stalked by himself._ Raph wasn't going to say any of that, although it was perfectly true and accurate. Raph rubbed his forehead again, his eyes trying to seal him away again. When had he slept?

_Never, you can't run and sleep._ But when he shut his eyes the teeth returned and his own hating, feral eyes looked back.

He forced them open and sighed with all the gruffness and exasperation that he hated in himself.

And his brothers were being so quiet. Well, maybe they weren't and Raphael wasn't allowing himself to hear it. That was silly though... Why weren't they punishing him and chastising him for his failure. Didn't they go in his room? Didn't they see?

_Of course they saw, they were just waiting for you to leave. They want to know your weaknesses so they can control you._

Maybe maybe. Raph frowned, and gingerly poked Michelangelo in the chest, because he was closest, with the same kind of curiosity as any scientist with a discovery.

"How did you all get here?" He accused as if trying to get them to admit they were apparitions. The first night, so long ago, he had discarded his communicator, intent on not being found.

Donny's eyes glinted, "Partial instinct, partial deductive reasoning."

"Why not." Raph responded, shrugging mostly to the skeptical shadows.

The east was beginning to turn hazy with indigo that meant that morning wasn't far away. They would have to run again, but Raph was ready. Raph began fingering his knuckles at his mouth again.

_Are you insane Raph? What are you doing?_ Raphael didn't know what he was doing, he didn't know where he was. While his brothers looked at him, with anxiety to take him home and fear as his wide eyes darted hopelessly behind his sweat soaked mask, he realized he was lost because he was supposed to be with them and didn't know how to get there.

"What did you do Raph?" Leo pressed on, sealing the box so the four of them huddled with Raph's shell against the wall.

"Mmm?" Raph hummed, looking suddenly at Leo and his sai that had been tucked safely into the eldest brother's belt. "You don't know?"

"Not if you don't tell us."

Stealthily he saw himself scaling the catwalks without a sound and disappearing, but realized that lurking monster couldn't be him, because no one could watch themselves like that. He shut his eyes, and focused on the face with the blood stained teeth. And for a moment he forgot which end was up and touched foreheads with Donny as he tipped forward.

"No."

They must have realized he wasn't talking to them because they didn't ask what he was disagreeing with. Or maybe it was obvious he meant the hideous face that was only there when he began to fall asleep. No.

_Is it me? Is it the one that's telling you to steal back your sai and show them how you've disgraced them?_

Maybe, maybe…

Raphael looked up at his brothers, and gazed at his hand. His wrist facing in the trickle of hate and defeat shown. His sighed again, trying to sigh away the voices as he had with the others.

"Here, who wants it?" He murmered, looking over his bewildered brother's faces and gave his hand to Leo, who seemed to want it the least. "That's what I did."

The light was miniscule, but they'd grown used to it. At first confused, Leo looked at the palm in his, then noticed what Raph was offering and peeled the wrist band that relinquished with a wet sucking sound.

Raph grimaced, turning his head away, and Leo when lip curled it was a mask of Raph's own face. Mikey seized the other wrist, revealing the same sick wet wound of deep parallel lines. His brothers didn't make a sound. Raph though, seeing his own failure for the first time in a new light gagged dryly, and had no where to divert his eyes but up.

When Raph thought about it, he wasn't the hateful voice, the silent stalker or the hideous face, he was actually pretty simple. Maybe that day he'd seen himself for the first time, enjoying his family's company and laughing. And couldn't admit for the first time in his life there wasn't a thing wrong with him except what he had hidden in a towel under his bed.

But so close, so close. The fact that he'd even woken up again…

"Okay," Raph said, shivering. He contemplated the silence of the alley and of his mind, and found that he was purged, because there were no more voices, no more shadows. "Let's get out of here."

Mikey sighed with audible relief. Leo clutched his younger brother's wrist still, but had pulled out his communicator with the other hand. "Sensei, he's with us… yes… better than okay."


End file.
